Agency Description/Mission: Disability benefits are temporary cash benefits paid to an eligible wage earner, when he/she is disabled by an OFF THE JOB injury or illness. The Disability Benefits Law provides weekly cash benefits to replace, in part, wages lost due to injuries or illnesses that do not arise out of or in the course of employment. Disability benefits are also paid to an unemployed worker to replace unemployment insurance benefits lost because of illness or injury. Rather than establish another government agency, the Legislature placed responsibility for the administration of the law within the Workers' Compensation Board. New York is one of only six jurisdictions to provide off-the-job benefits, allowing hand-tailored benefit plans and agreements for particular employee groups or industries.

Agency Description/Mission: Unemployment insurance is temporary income for eligible workers who become unemployed through no fault of their own and who are ready, willing, and able to work and have sufficient work and wages in covered employment. In New York State, the money for unemployment insurance benefits comes from taxes paid by employers. No deductions are ever made from a worker's paycheck for it. It is the Department of Labor that determines whether an unemployed worker qualifies for unemployment.

Agency Description/Mission: The Division of Labor Standards enforces the New York State Labor Laws concerning minimum wage, hours of work, child labor, payment of wages and wage supplements, industrial homework, apparel industry registration and farm labor. It also administers the Employment Agency Law (Article 11 of the General Business Law) outside New York City.

6. Workers' Compensation (for job-related injuries or illness)

Agency Description/Mission: The Workers' Compensation Board administers five benefit programs which protect the rights of injured workers. These are: the Workers' Compensation Law; the Disability Benefits Law; the Volunteer Firefighters' Benefit Law; the Volunteer Ambulance Workers' Benefit Law; and the Workers' Compensation Act for Civil Defense Volunteers. In administering the Workers' Compensation program, the Board receives and processes workers' claims for benefits, employers' reports of injury, and medical reports from physicians and other health care providers. The board adjudicates and resolves all issues and makes awards and findings as rapidly as possible to ensure that an entitled claimant receives benefits and medical treatment promptly.

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